Murder at Keyhaven Castle Page 14

  Stella had cried more in the past hour than she had her entire lifetime. Her head pounded, her whole body ached, but the tears had dried up, her nose had stopped running, and she welcomed the reassuring rocking of Tully beneath her as they rode. Out in the fresh air with the sun on her back, away from the dank, dark, closeted castle tower room, she was able to face the truth, the complete and brutally honest truth. That, alongside the shock, the guilt, and the grief, was a lightness, an unexpected sense of relief.

  She shivered. Had the breeze cut through her dress, or was the chill from something else? Seeking reassurance, Stella leaned forward to stroke Tully’s shoulder. She was startled to find her horse’s sleek coat foamed with sweat.

  How long had they been riding? Where were they? The landscape caught her off-guard. They’d crossed the spit, passed the marshes, climbed the banks of the shoreline, navigated the path through the shrubby coastal heath, and had entered Whitley Wood not far from Rosehurst. The journey had been a blank. She couldn’t remember any of it.

  What Stella painfully remembered was the police wagon rumbling away, carting both Sir Owen and her father’s body back to Lyndhurst: one to the police station, the other to Dr. Lipscombe’s examining table. With an autopsy, Brown promised they’d determine precisely how her father had died.

  Does it matter?

  She turned in the saddle, expecting a slow cavalcade of carriages, like a funeral procession, following behind. Only the dogcart with Lister, Sir Owen’s mount, tied to the back, followed. But where were Ethel and the children? Uncle Jed? Aunt Ivy? The Swensons?

  “Most of the others went back to Pilley Manor.” Lyndy, answering her unvoiced question, swayed comfortably in the saddle as he rode alongside her. “I’m taking you to Morrington. I don’t think you should be alone right now.”

  Stella agreed. She wasn’t sure she could ever go back to Pilley Manor. There were too many memories of her father there.

  When they approached Morrington Hall, sunlight reflecting off the chimneys jutting above the trees, Stella was struck by the resemblance of the first time she’d traveled up this drive. She, pushing the gas of the Daimler, eager for a glimpse of the manor house, her father grumbling at her to slow down. Stella had had no idea then the secret her father held, how he’d sold her off like one of his horses, for his own benefit. She’d resented him for it, almost hated him. Now she just felt drained.

  A pig, pink and barrel-shaped with large black spots, emerged suddenly from the wood, its snout to the ground, industriously wiggling and sniffing out its quarry—fallen acorns. It crossed the driveway, oblivious of the horses, and disappeared into the trees on the other side. Lyndy clicked his tongue, urging the horses, distracted by the pig, to move on.

  Stella adored the New Forest. How lucky she was to call it her adopted home. And how happy I am with Lyndy.

  Thankfully, the engagement hadn’t been the nightmare Stella feared it would be. She’d grown to respect, admire, dare she even say love, her betrothed. But her father couldn’t have known that, nor did he care. And it didn’t excuse how all of this came about. He’d done it for selfish reasons, wanting a British title he could brag about, that would guarantee an invitation into the highest society. How trivial the resentment, the anger, the disappointment she’d felt at his betrayal seemed now. None of it mattered. In two days, Stella would become Viscountess Lyndhurst, and her father wouldn’t be there to witness it or brag about it to his friends. Nor would he ever see the inside of Mrs. Astor’s ballroom.

  When they arrived, Stella allowed Lyndy to lift her down from the saddle, as Mack, the scruffy stray, barked at the horses, leaping and dodging, encouraging them to play. In his excitement, Mack leaped up on Lyndy, stamping his jacket with two muddy paw prints. Lyndy ruffled the dog’s head before shooing Mack away. Tully whinnied softly and nudged Stella with her muzzle, seeking the peppermint treats she so loved. Stella didn’t have any and instead threw her arms around Tully’s slick, muscular neck, tears spilling down her cheeks and onto the mare’s glossy coat. Stella clung to her horse until she felt calm again. Then she stepped back and handed Leonard the reins. The groom clicked his tongue, encouraging the horses to walk toward the stables. The dog scampered after.

  Heartened by the warmth and enthusiasm of the animals, Stella brushed the tears away with the back of her hand and offered Lyndy a reassuring smile. He offered his arm, and the two strolled toward the house.

  A small crowd of people: Lord and Lady Atherly, Lady Alice, Mrs. Swenson, Reverend Paine, a half dozen servants, had clustered in the hall and accosted them the moment Fulton opened the door. They’d been waiting for them. Reverend Paine was the first to approach as Lyndy handed the butler his hat. Stella had no idea where she’d left hers.

  “My dear, dear Miss Kendrick.” Holding his folded hands over his heart, the vicar wore his sense of importance as blatantly as the spectacles on his face. “May the Lord bless you and watch over you.”

  Barely in his middle thirties, the Reverend had gained his current living due to tragedy. But the circumstances hadn’t humbled him. Instead, the vicar had perceived his predecessor’s sudden demise, and his subsequent promotion, as an act of God, or so it seemed to Stella, and fully embraced his role as spiritual counselor to Lord Atherly and his family.

  “I am so very, very sorry to hear about your father. Poor soul. I pray he’s now at peace. If you would like, I can pray with you at any time.”

  Stella, not surprised the news had reached Morrington Hall before she did, mumbled something noncommittal. Daddy, at peace? Stella couldn’t imagine it. Especially the way he went out of this world. Besides, Reverend Paine was the last person she wanted to engage in conversation with right now. But the vicar wasn’t done.

  “How very sad, how tragic. Cut down in the prime of his life. To think I was here finalizing the wedding service. And now it must be postponed.”

  Postponed? No. This wedding was what her father wanted.

  “Daddy wouldn’t want it postponed.”

  Mrs. Swenson, her silk skirts rustling, swooped in to gather Stella in a comforting embrace. She smelled of lilacs and lemon. “Oh, you poor, poor orphaned child.”

  Stella, typically one to initiate personal contact, stiffened at the woman’s touch.

  “We’re so sorry for you,” Mrs. Swenson went on, motherly fingering a loose strand of Stella’s hair. “Aren’t we, Penny?” Without waiting for her daughter’s reply, she added, “You must feel awful.”

  “As bad as she looks, I reckon,” Penny muttered.

  Stella hadn’t given a single thought to her appearance, but leave it to Penny to notice how disheveled she was. It was the least of Stella’s concerns.

  “I did so like Elijah,” she added. “And to be murdered . . .” She dropped her voice to a whisper on the last word as if the very mention of it was scandalous. “But,” she continued at a more natural volume, “we can all rest easier knowing he’s in a better place.”

  Stella knew no such thing and wished the woman would go away.

  “I agree with Reverend Paine,” Lady Atherly said when Mrs. Swenson released her grip and stepped aside. “The wedding must be postponed. The mourning period prohibits going ahead as planned.”

  In her dark blue day dress, Lady Atherly appeared already dressed for mourning. Yet she’d said nothing about Stella’s father. No condolences. No outpouring of false sympathy, no pretense of regret her father was dead. Instead, Lady Atherly had found another excuse to put off the wedding. She was nothing if not consistent. In an odd way, it was refreshing, and Stella respected her for it.

  “Of course you do, Mother,” Lyndy scoffed. “You’ve been trying to break off our engagement since the moment you met Mr. Kendrick.”

  “God rest his soul,” Reverend Paine chimed, raising his gaze toward the ceiling.

  “Now, now, Lord Lyndhurst,” Mrs. Swenson chided gently. “Your mother is trying to do what’s best. Elijah is dead, and a member of your family is accus
ed of killing him. Consider how scandalous it would be if y’all defied convention. Stella needs to mourn him properly.”

  “Owen didn’t kill anyone,” Lyndy insisted.

  But Mrs. Swenson continued as if she hadn’t heard. “But your gracious mother didn’t say to cancel the wedding, now did she? She said to postpone. And for what it’s worth, I agree.”

  “No one asked for your opinion,” Lyndy sneered.

  Stella squeezed his arm. Arguing wasn’t helping lessen her unhappiness. She knew of only two ways to do that.

  “We will be getting married,” Stella whispered, adamantly voicing one way. “For Daddy’s sake. It’s what he wanted.”

  Lyndy nodded curtly in agreement, pulling her tighter to him until the length of their sides touched as if daring anyone to separate them.

  “We can discuss this later.” Lady Alice was suddenly at Stella’s side, carefully prying Stella from her brother’s grip. “Stella’s had a shock. We all have. I think she needs to be lying down.”

  “You are absolutely right, Alice,” Lady Atherly said. “Fulton, see that Miss Kendrick’s old room is prepared.” Stella had stayed here when she’d first arrived in England, seemingly a lifetime ago. “And see that Ethel comes from Pilley Manor straightaway.”

  Stella rewarded Lady Alice’s surprising kindness and fortitude with a smile of gratitude. She’d rescued her from the well-meaning but suffocating attention.

  Mrs. Swenson twittered about, counting off reasons why Stella should come back with her to Pilley Manor, to be with kin, to let her and Penny console her, to change into something more suitable, but everyone ignored her. After Lyndy gave her a reassuring peck on the cheek, she drifted after the butler up the grand staircase, trusting her feet to know the way, for her mind was preoccupied, making plans, deciding the best way to proceed.

  To track down the truth about her father’s murder.

  * * *

  The moment the door closed, Stella flipped off the stifling sheets and blankets and put her feet on the floor. They all had good intentions. But laying idly in bed wasn’t part of her plan. She pulled the satin and lace nightgown Ethel insisted on borrowing from Lady Alice over her head. With her clothes banished to the laundry, Stella dressed in the white shirtwaist and embroidered light and dark blue skirt (also borrowed from Lady Alice) her maid had laid out before she left.

  Stella put her ear to the door. Ethel’s footsteps no longer echoed on the other side. Counting silently to ten, she opened the door and slipped into the hall. Memories, of sneaking out of her room in Kentucky as a girl, rushed into her mind. She hadn’t done it often, but each time warranted the necessary risk, or so she’d thought at the time. When Tully was a foal, for a reason she could no longer remember, her father had forbidden her to go to the stables for three days. But Tully had been colicky, so Stella had risked the willow switch to check on her.

  The memory stung. Her father’s cruelties had stamped her heart, like a brand on a cattle’s hide. But with him dead, so too were her hopes he’d ever make right what he’d done. But then how was she going to mourn him properly, as Mrs. Swenson suggested? How was she going to make peace with him as a daughter should, and move on with her life?

  By catching his killer, for a start.

  Stella tiptoed down the hall to the servants’ door at the far end. When the thick green baize door closed behind her, she sighed in relief. No one upstairs could hear her. No one downstairs would stop her. She scurried down the narrow, dimly lit stairs toward the servants’ hall, the braid down her back bouncing like a horse’s tail ready for the show ring. The comforting fragrance of freshly baked bread met her at the bottom. Her stomach rumbled. Having to forgo the picnic, Stella hadn’t eaten since breakfast. She spied Mrs. Cole’s kitchen maid laying out a plate of yeast rolls for the servants’ tea. Stella hastened in and snatched a roll from the plate, still warm to the touch. The maid squeaked in surprise. With a finger across her lips, Stella helped herself to an apple from a plate of fruit. Ignoring the maid’s gawping stare, Stella left the servants’ hall and hurried toward the tradesmen’s entrance. She yanked it open. A warm, fresh breeze ruffled her shirtwaist and the tendrils of hair on her forehead. She stepped into the sunshine and paused to inhale the sweet musky autumn air, noting the lingering scent of burnt oak still tainted it. She crossed the gravel yard, skirted the stone walls separating the back entrance from the gardens, and headed down the garden path.

  “Miss!” Charlie, the stable hand, exclaimed when she strode into the stable. He stammered a moment, uncertain what else to say, and dashed toward the harness room, where Mr. Gates was often found.

  “Miss Kendrick,” Mr. Gates said, popping his head out, a frown on his taut, sun-weathered face. “What tragic news about your father.”

  Of course, he would know, she reminded herself. Everyone from Lymington to Fordingbridge must know what had happened by now.

  “You have our sincere condolences. If there’s anything . . . ?”

  “Thank you, Mr. Gates.” After talking so much in her head, the sound of her voice sounded hollow and far away. “If it’s all the same to you, I would like to go for a ride.”

  “Of course,” he said as if they were all carrying on as usual. “Charlie! Saddle up Tully. That’s a good lad.” Charlie tipped his cap at her. “And be quick about it.”

  Charlie dashed off to his task. Stella and Mr. Gates waited in the dim light of the aisle in awkward silence. The scent of the hay, the leather polish, the horse dung mingled in her nose as she waited. A wave of security, like a mother’s embrace, washed over Stella at the sight of Tully swishing her tail and bobbing her head in greeting. Shunning offers of help, she hoisted herself into the saddle, feeling more grounded on Tully’s back than she did with her feet on the floor.

  She nodded Mr. Gates her thanks, clicked her tongue, and she and Tully were off. The moment they cleared the stable door, Tully, as if sensing Stella’s need, picked up her pace. By the time they’d passed the paddocks and reached the open heath, Tully was cantering. Soon they reached a line of towering oaks, planted in a row hundreds of years ago. Stella guided Tully down the dirt track that paralleled the tree line, not knowing where it led, and let Tully break into a run. Dust kicked up and wind rushed at her face. Stella’s braid kept time, rhythmically thumping against her back, the peach ribbon tied at the end fluttering like a flag, as Tully raced across the landscape.

  And for a long time (how long she had no idea), she thought of nothing but keeping her seat. But when she leaned into a jump over a small seasonal pond, the horror of Pistol Prescott’s last moments burst into her mind. Was it only yesterday he’d died? That she’d learned of his threats toward someone at Morrington Hall?

  Now Daddy is dead too.

  Exhausted, tears whipped from her cheeks by the wind before she could wipe them away, her thoughts spiraled out of control.

  Both were horsemen from Kentucky. Could it be a coincidence? Mr. Swenson and Uncle Jed were also both horsemen from Kentucky. For that matter, so was she. Were their lives in danger too?

  Shoving such ridiculous ideas aside, Stella concentrated on the long black strands of her dapple-gray’s mane, whipping around her neck. But the questions continued to hound her.

  Who did kill her father? Sir Owen? Almost anyone she could think of, Uncle Jed included, had more of a reason than Sir Owen did. And what about the jockey? Was the jockey’s death an accident, as her father’s first appeared to be? Maybe someone pushed him into the oncoming runaway carriage? But why? And who had Pistol Prescott wanted to kill? Was it a coincidence her father was now dead too? Until now, she and everyone else had assumed it was Lyndy or Lord Atherly or even perhaps one of the male servants at Morrington Hall. Could her father have been the jockey’s intended victim? Maybe Pistol Prescott had made the same mistake Uncle Jed did by thinking Stella and her father were living at Morrington Hall? But that assumed someone else was involved, someone who followed them to the castle and finis
hed what Pistol Prescott started. But if so, why not use Pistol Prescott’s gun? Why do it at the castle? Why do it all? Nothing made any sense.

  As her questions twisted in and around themselves, Stella urged Tully to run faster, as if she could outrun them, or find answers waiting over the next rise. They entered a stand of spindly old gorse bushes, bare but for their prickles, like cactus in the desert. She leaned low to avoid the shrubs, her face inches from Tully’s neck. When they left the gorse, a gust of wind whipped strands of Tully’s mane across her face. Stella didn’t notice the outstretching branch of a young oak tree before it was too late.

  CHAPTER 16

  Inspector Brown wrinkled his nose. The overuse of furniture wax did nothing to hide the pervasive odor of stale cigar. With their glassy stares warily guarding the door, the deer heads mounted on the dark paneled walls did nothing to put him at ease. Did they know something he didn’t? In a rare moment of optimism last spring, after using it during another murder investigation, Brown believed he’d seen the last of Lord Atherly’s smoking room. But he was fortunate Lord Atherly had kindly offered the use of it again. What was regrettable was Brown’s requiring it at all.

  Staring at the large antlers perched above the door, Brown mentally checked off his witness list.

  The first to be interviewed was Ethel Eakins. Having been put through the paces during the last investigation, Miss Kendrick’s lady’s maid had eagerly cooperated. She’d supplied herself, the footman, and the children alibis (a necessity Brown had never seriously entertained). Otherwise, she could do nothing more than confirm encountering Lord Lyndhurst, Miss Kendrick, and Mr. Swenson in the courtyard soon thereafter. She had no knowledge of Sir Owen’s or Mr. Kendrick’s movements. James, the footman, the second to arrive, corroborated everything the maid had said.

  Mr. Swenson, too, was forthcoming, confessing to getting separated from Mr. Kendrick after touring the castle together when the victim wanted to linger over the view from the battlements. The punishing winds, Mr. Swenson explained, had made his ears ache. Like the maid and the footman, Mr. Swenson had only recently met Sir Owen and had no idea why he’d have cause to kill Mr. Kendrick. After an admonishment to contact him if they thought of anything else, Brown had let each go after a few minutes.